CyberGene Indeed, but the funny thing is it still worked although covered in dust! It's currently stocked at another apartment and covered with cloth. If I take it back, I'll think of a case.
Yes, very interesting indeed. I must admit that I am also very interested in classical piano mechanics. There are a lot of videos on youtube on the subject, including restorations. It's amazing how dirty some action systems are and yet still work, but of course only with restrictions.
CyberGene It costed me €1100, a 100-something year old 85-key action 🙂 It was in good condition according to the technician who gave it to me but I had to do some repairs (I changed all the white key covers and also created my own wooden support beams to level the action brackets, because apparently some technician had made some reworking on the action in the past and that repair was already "for repair" itself).
Frankly, I have no idea how expensive piano actions are, a consumer market doesn't really exist. I think it's great that you were able to repair/adjust the action yourself.
CyberGene But take in mind grand pianos are not very popular in Bulgaria. We have always been a rather poor country, lost two world-wars and I guess not many people could afford spending for a grand piano. Those are mostly imported grand pianos from Germany which are in bad condition and mostly used for only their casing, they remove the action and throw it away and just put a digital piano inside and use those in night clubs and bars... 🤦🏻♂️I think the action could have been free but since I looked for one, they probably saw a good chance to charge me.
Yes that's a shame, so to charge a lot of money for something that might be much cheaper to get. I didn't know that the cases with digtal elements are used for a "second life" until now.
CyberGene I only asked for a grand piano action. It turned out there are the so called Viennese actions that lack double-escapement and those are more easily found because they are considered cr*p and so the pianos are more easily found dirt cheap (and since the action will be discarded...). I wanted the other, so called English action, but there weren't any available. However after a month I received a call for an English action, hence with double escapement. Didn't have any choice or chance to test. So, I said yes and hoped it would be at least semi-decent. BTW, it was only after it was delivered that I realized there's such a thing as 85-key pianos... I wasn't happy but that's life. At least music written before the end of the 19th century isn't using the three topmost keys
As I said, I don't know the end user market. That's why I didn't know that the Viennese piano action were considered junk. I always thought that these piano action were seen more in the sense of historical. And therefore actually still have a certain value.
Just for interest, I did a quick search on Ebay.de for used piano mechanics and didn't find anything interesting, but for example, this instrument could be bought complete for 700€. There is no description of how good the piano action is. I also don't know if this Blüthner has a Viennese piano action. But it has 88 keys. The transport to Bulgaria certainly makes the instrument financially uninteresting, but if you know someone here in Germany who could buy the instrument and send the piano action alone to you, an alternative with 88 keys would be possible.
If the 3 keys are important to you, a nice occasion for the next "project V2" (oh that is not exactly politically correct, historically speaking). 🤣
